Research Memos

Since coming aboard in May 2010, project coordinator and instructor John (also known as Edward) Dallas has been working hard to familiarize MHA residents with the operations and governance of the planned MHA housing co-op, through one-on-one meetings and workshops. At the same time, John has also been working closely with the MHA board, the sponsor of the co-op conversion. Drawing on his extensive dual legal and co-op background (elaborated on below as well as on his CV posted on this Web site), John’s most important activity in this collaboration has been an ongoing review of the MHA Cooperative Information Package or offering plan. John’s findings and recommendations can be found in his research memorandums to the MHA board, some of which can be accessed here.

John is a formally trained, certified, and highly-experienced litigation paralegal and a published legal researcher and writer. He has been a shareholder in two limited-equity housing co-ops. One of these was a Mitchell-Lama housing co-op, located in The Bronx, the fifth largest housing co-op in the nation, with over 1,865 shareholders and a multimillion-dollar annual budget; John served as president of the board of directors. He has also worked with The New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development’s TIL (Tenant Interim Lease) program. In this capacity, John provided a full range of technical assistance — for example, conducting and monitoring elections, mediating disputes between board members or between boards and shareholders, providing advice on the selection of professionals, and offering classes on the governing documents and applicable federal, state, and city laws and regulations — to TIL (tenant-managed City-owned) buildings and HDFCs (resident-controlled low-income housing corporations) in The Bronx.